Thursday, July 12, 2018

BAE's Howitzer is having major issues...

via Bloomberg.

BAE Systems Plc’s manufacture of the U.S. Army’s new howitzer is hobbled by poor welding, supply chain problems and delivery delays even as the service nears a $1.3 billion decision on full production, according to the Pentagon’s contract management agency.

Among the setbacks have been a six-month halt in deliveries last year because of welding flaws and the return of 50 of 86 vehicles that had already been delivered due to repair production deficiencies.

Nevertheless, Army officials plan to meet on Thursday to decide on approval of full-rate production, the most lucrative phase for London-based BAE. That would trigger $1.3 billion in contract options and increase vehicle production to about 60 from 48 a year, according to a Pentagon program assessment.

The Pentagon’s Defense Contract Management Agency “assesses that BAE is currently experiencing significant supply-chain, part quality and delivery issues,” spokesman Mark Woodbury said in an email. “DCMA’s assessment has been shared with” the Army and “could potentially aid the program office’s final decision to proceed” to full-rate production, he said.

I'm a BAE fanboy and one of the reasons why they were able to decisviely beat SAIC/ST Kinetics is because they were able to execute.

They were on time and on target with every point of the contest for the ACV...their competitors were not. The competition paid the price in having an excellent vehicle that showed more poorly than it should have because of their basic failure in doing basic stuff.

Now?

Now we're seeing the same company that was able to get it done by the numbers stumble and fall in delivering quality vehicles to the US Army.

Bad welds?

That's important but simple shit they should get right. Delivery chain issues? Important but again simple (for an organization like BAE) shit they should get right.

Don't know what's going on with BAE but they're starting to command a significant portion of our armored vehicle fleet (that's actually in service/slated to be in service) and they must do better.